Aerosol and cloud play important roles in determining the earth's climate. Along with the further knowledge about these important roles, the researches on the interaction between aerosol and cloud became more and more important. A comprehensive review about the research methods and the development in recent twenty years on this field is discussed in this paper. The observation by airplane, satellite and the composite method of observation and model were the main research method in this research. Some data of observation and the model results have given evidences of the influence between aerosol and the other cloud physical characteristics including radiation, cloud drop and precipitation. Aerosol can transform to the cloud condensation nucleus (CCN) in some special situations. Through this process, aerosol influences the cloud characteristics. Therefore, the CCN is an important link in all interaction theory between aerosol and cloud. There were great progresses in the observation technology of CCN. The nonlinear relationship between saturated water vapor pressure and temperature was used to make the instrument to observe the CCN. The related theories about CCN and cloud also have made some progresses. In China, the research methods were changed from the analyzing single observation data to the way of using model and the methods combining observation and model. Finally, several pieces of proposal are brought forward in this research area.